Who were your favorite authors as a child? Who are your favorite
authors now? Which authors do you think have most influenced you as a
writer?

As a child, it was the staples of a British child's reading in the
1950/60s — Enid Blyton, Richmal Crompton, C.S. Lewis, the odd dip into
the recognised "Classics", Hergé's Tintin, later — and
inevitably — Tolkien. Nowadays, it's more likely to be Dickens,
Jose Saramago, James Hogg, Laurence Sterne, Mervyn Peake, Michael
Innes, Marquez, W.G. Sebald, Le Carre, R.L. Stevenson, Zola, Dumas,
Thomas Mann. As a writer, I'd have to say the first four of these
have had most influence on me — but I've read quite widely over the
years, and I can see that various medieval/post-medieval French and
German authors have also influenced both my subject-matter and my
style.

Do you mean the first four
of the list of your current favorites, or the
first four in the list as a whole?

Yes — when I say the "first four", I mean Dickens—Sterne.

You studied Modern Languages at the university, and you've published
several translations from German. What other natural languages
besides German have you studied? Do you consider yourself fluent in
any others? Do you consider yourself fluent in any other constructed
languages besides Volapük?

I studied both French and German at university, and can hold
reasonable conversations in, and read easily, both of these. My
parents were both linguists — my father in particular had a great
enthusiasm for languages: in his time, he studied German, French,
Italian, Spanish, Norwegian, Greek, Hungarian, Turkish — even sitting
a basic exam in Rumanian, self-taught, at the age of 67! But I don't
consider myself fluent in Volapük at all — that would imply a
reasonable level of practice: I struggle with it — it's a language
that requires considerable thought. From what little I know of it,
Esperanto seems a far more fluid language (but that's not an
endorsement!!)

Do you use the word "linguist" in the older sense of
"polyglot" or the newer sense of "philologist" or
"language scientist"?

"Linguist" simply as "a student of language",
certainly in the older sense. I love to find the hidden commonality
of vocabulary of languages of the same family. But I am far from
being a scientist of language — just a gourmet.

How did you first get interested in the international language
movement and Volapük, Esperanto and Solresol in
particular?

To be honest, I can't hit on a defining moment. I came across
Volapük when researching into something else related to my first
novel, An Abridged History; and tucked the reference away
for future consideration. The more I found out about its early
history, the more fascinated I became with this rather obscure
alley-way of linguistics. From Volapük, there was an obvious
trajectory into looking at all the other "Universal
Languages" which proliferated in the 19th century: some were
manifestly bizarre, some were wonderfully naïve — I collect
"oddities".

I have to confess to being a bit astounded by the interest which my
"Handbook" has stirred up in the few weeks since publication
— my first inkling of it was when I saw Rick Harrison's splendid
review on Amazon. And then, last week when I was doing a reading at
the Edinburgh
International Book Festival, I was quite un-nerved to be
approached by a member of the audience and spoken to in Volapük.

I have to say that the interest in my book has not just been from
linguists of various shades, but equally from the general reading
public.

Anyway, it will not have escaped your notice, I suspect, that my take
on International Languages is slightly divergent from that of the
I.L. movement itself.

How did you do your research on the early history of Volapük and
Esperanto? What books besides Charles Sprague's Hand-book of
Volapük did you find most useful? Did you make contact with
current Volapük or Esperanto speakers?

Some will no doubt criticise me for it, but my lingustic research more
or less stopped with a down-loaded copy of Sprague's Hand-book (thanks
to http://personal.southern.edu/~caviness).
I think, when you're creating fiction, there is a point at which fact
must be left behind and imagination must take over. So, although my
intention was to create a language manual with a difference, it was
also to write an entertaining story: sometimes too much fact just gets
in the way. Interestingly, the publication of the book has brought a
number of UK-based Volapük-ists to my attention, as well as those
in the USA.

Not at all, I fear (but if you have a copy, I'd be interested to see
it — its very title sounds like fun!). The antagonism between
Justice and Bosman is simply a reflection of my own experience in
similar "agitating" groups as a student, when factional
intrigue became far more important — and possibly far more
fascinating — than the stated objectives of the groups.

The main characters in your book speak about a "universal
language"; nowadays proponents of Esperanto, Interlingua and so
forth use the term "international language", and the
transition seems to have happened not long after the period when
A Hand-book of Volapük is set. To what extent do you
think this change in terminology reflects a real change in philosophy
or goals?

I fear I cannot give any sensible response to that. My suspicion is
that the term "universal" was indeed replaced somewhere
close to the First World War, by the peace-movements which arose
beside or from the social-democracy movements of the time —
"international-ism" became a more widely-recognised concept.
But I may be quite wrong on that.

In a couple of places I noticed Mr. Justice making prophecies about
the future of Volapük which arguably turned out to be true, except
that they were true about Esperanto. To what extent was this
deliberate?

It was deliberate to the extent that the early Volapük-ists
doubtless considered their language to be the language of the future
-- only for them to see the advantage slip away from them towards
Esperanto. I enjoy seeing history from the "wrong end"
— my first novel, An Abridged History, has as one
of its themes the imagined technical wonders of the 20th century, as
envisaged by the late Victorians.

Did Volapük deserve its fate? Would the world be a better place if
Schleyer and the Academy had resolved their quarrel, or do you reckon
would the movement have fallen apart sooner or later for other
reasons?

My view is that Volapük, though cunning in its architecture, was
simply far too complex for its own good. Even if the various factions
had not fallen out, I doubt it could have held back Esperanto.
However, I think there are also broader issues here: two of the
questions I raise in my book — and I do not claim to know the
answer to either — are these: firstly, the "universal
languages" are in themselves very Euro-centric — that is,
their vocabulary and grammar is based almost exclusively around the
Romance or Germanic language-groups — what should Africans,
Asians, Chinese people make of them? Secondly, can a "universal
language" ever be anything more than a common means for
facilitating communication between different nations — that is,
could and should it ever aspire to be the only language which all
people use all the time? Volapük, for example, tried to cover every
possible nuance of grammar, but fell down badly on the vocabulary; in
trying to be all things to all men, it rapidly became nothing to
anybody. My own personal belief — anathema perhaps to
international languages — is that variety in all things can only
be healthy.

How did you decide to write about the census? Had you, for
instance, picked the period when the story would take place and looked
for major events of that period that could be tied in, or were you
already interested in the census procedures and so forth beforehand?

The Census was just another interest arising from previous work.
Clearly, when you're writing about the late Victorian period, and want
some solid, real background, the Population Census is an unbeatable
source; it then occurred to me that a great starting-place for a novel
would be all the stories which could be revealed to the Census Officer
as he collected the data. When I then got down to writing the
Volapük novel, the Census story was a very convenient mechanism for
moving along some of the plot. It's also interesting that the Census
forms in those days did ask whether English or Gaelic was a person's
"native" tongue — something that indicates the state
of language in Scotland at that time.

How did you first get interested in Sir Thomas
Urquhart? — through the Scottish history or literature
connection, or the constructed language connection, or in some other
way?

How much of Sir Thomas's work have you read? How much of it would
you recommend? Are there some of his works now out of print that
deserve rediscovery?

I've read The
Jewel several times over, but would be hard pushed to recommend
it to others, except as a reference to his use of language: it's
fascinating, but decidely an acquired taste. Obviously, his
translations of Rabelais are highly readable. I've also had a look at
some of his early Epigrams, which are entertainingly rude.

I can see where most of the aspects of Sir Thomas's character
and the things he does and says are well supported by his
surviving works. I'm curious about the helmet, cloak and scimitar,
however — is it something from Sir Thomas's life or works,
or from another historical source, or something you made up?

I'm not entirely sure myself where these items came from! Not from
Sir Thomas' works, certainly. If the equipment is symbolic of anything
(and I'm not sure it is) then it would be of the potentially, and
usually ephemeral, dictatorial power of the teacher over the pupils.

Several aspects of your story — the treatment of the dirigible,
the mechanical translating engine, and so forth — seem
reminiscent of the California Steampunk authors
— James Blaylock, Tim Powers, K.W. Jeter. Are you familiar with
their work?

Short answer: no, none of them are authors I've heard of. One of the
many wonderful things about the Victorians was their ability to dream
up fascinating devices. For part of the research into my novel, I did
also look into the works relating to Lunatic Asylums and in several of
these I found case-studies of men who had "invented" all
manner of wonderful "engines" — some of these just
seemed too good to ignore!

What are your writing habits like? Do you have a set time
of day for writing, a daily word count goal? Are you generally
revising one piece while writing another, or do you keep
those phases separate?

Since I have a full-time job, Monday to Friday, I tend to limit myself
to writing 8 or so hours at weekends, and maybe four hours during the
week. If things are going well, I can take a couple of days off work
and storm at it! I generally try to write a 'chapter' in two or three
consecutive sittings, with a goal of x-thousand words per chapter —
2500 words per day is my best rate. And I can usually only manage to
work on one piece at a time.

What tools do you use for writing? Do you write first drafts
directly on a word processor or text editor, for instance, or
draft with pen or pencil and rewrite on the word processor?

I do almost everything on computer these days, apart from maybe a few
brief notes to myself on scraps of paper. It is so much easier to
juggle ideas that way.

Do you outline a novel before starting to write it? If so, in how
much detail? How much did your first couple of novels
deviate from their outlines in the course of writing?

I usually have a master-plan, but frequently find myself deviating
from it, especially when the plot, of itself, begins to grow arms and
legs. The first draft of my first novel, An Abridged
History, was about twice the length of the final version, and
there was considerable re-working of the plot; the Volapük novel
was far easier to write and keep to the plan.

How long had you been writing fiction before you sold
An Abridged History?

I've been writing fiction — mostly short-stories — since I
was a student, back in the 1970s. But most of it was just for my own
enjoyment. Various attempts to get published simply failed, until an
extract from An Abridged History won a short-story prize
in 2002, and things then — eventually — took off.

On your website you describe your current novel in progress as "A
novel set in 1740, which deals with the Scottish noblewoman, Lady
Grange, who was kidnapped in 1732 by associates of her husband, and
kept prisoner on a succession of lonely and remote Scottish islands
— including St Kilda — until her death in 1745." Can
you say anything more about it at this point?

Not much more to say at the moment — the novel is finished, as
far as I'm concerned, and my publisher is currently considering it.
However, there are ceratin features of the novel which my publisher
may find hard to swallow — most notably the language and the
spelling — so I await his response with some trepidation.
However, I am formulating ideas for the next novel...

This interview first appeared in Esperanto USA, 2006/5-6.

The novel Drummond had just finished and submitted when this interview
was conducted
is Elephantina,
Polygon 2008. I plan to read it eventually, and will review it when I
do.